The Press., 1887-03-03
(Contributed.l

AN HOUR OR TWO WITH SOME OLD BOOKS.
 That afternoon tried to get nap-but the joys and sorrows of somebody's life time have recently been laid up Tn the wainscot of this venerable dwelling, and though am supposed to wear an armor of mail, yet the shrieking blast, as it struck the northwest corner at the head of my bed, sent their echoes through cuticle and cartilage, penetrating to the heart of hearts. Life is q memory. Sleep was i'm. possible, so I wandered to an apartment bestrewn with relic and ruin. Pausing, l opened the lid of an ancient red oaken chest. It is filled with old school books and keepsakes. The musty aroma seemed to me like @ sweet incense from a sacrih. cial altar, and young melodious voices rang out of the ashes of dead but never. to-be-forgotten past. Tenderly, as tho twere sacred thing, Hook over the old National Preceptor. Does not the sight of the familiar pieces bring an array oi faces-the living and the clay mouldering of all the first class readers, and the hap py and tedious hours of elocutiouary drill and pastime? Can you not remember the deep-toned eloquence of D. T., as he de. claimed -"Friends, Romans, Country. men l" and the fastidious intonations of N.
  ures of "The Mariners Dream, ""In Slum. ber's of Midnight the Sailor Boy Lay, ' etc. Here also IS Augustus Mitchell's Ge ography, with it's protected cover of ging. ham. Upon these maps all learned the way from Maine to Madagascar. Upon the fy-leaf is a blurred pencil sketch of a handful of gracefully bent twigs, within whose meshes lies an empty bird's-nest, and in heavy shading, underneath, the couplet,
 ''May thy heart be as free from all plagues As this dear little nest is from eggs"
 Signed 'sL4.r The book adheres to my hands, and for an hour, oblivious to things of time or sense, say to o.an imagined co. terie things too despairing, sad and satiri- cal to repeat.
 Another well-preseryed book is a vol. ume of Phebe Cary's poems. Reader, fancy that she prayed for you when she wrote
 ''9od spare you from doom like hers,
 Of living when the hopes are dead"
 In this promiscuous pile are are a collec. ton of colonial traditions. See the un. pretentious cut of Groton monument. Adown the slope from the obelisk to the Thames those rectangular divisions resem. ble SO many arid sheep pastures, while the four dwellings in center of Norwich Town remind you of ancient Quaker monasteries. If any are so benighted as to suppose the world has stood still during 50 years, they might take in something of the spirit oi the age in which they live by comparing the erowths of towns and cities, to say naught of the march in art or ology.
 In some newspaper recently the question was asked, "Where do the Almanacs go ?' Ransack any old attic that like this has existed ever since Miles Standish crossed over, and from within some chest or draw CT you can backward turn the leaves oi time but what nation preserves them like Americans It is constitutional, and as naturally as the Carolina planter eats boil'd rice without condiments, so does the New England farmer flank these stepping stones along down the ages.
 Now here, like fragment blossom upon broken stalk, lies the ue-covered "Day. spring"-the melodious hymn-book, from which the choir that rarely quarreled, of ''the old church on the Hill, offered praise. Mary, can you not catch the fine contralto of 'tBeautiful Zion, and the soft soprano of
 .sI love to steal awhile away
 From every cumb'ring care,
 And spend the hours of setting day." If the day happens to be Sunday, now complete the rhyme if not the meter. You wouldn't have thought 1t very sacri-lgious once. And can you not glance over the heads of the congregation and see the al. most majestic form of the preacher, the late Rev. Joel R. Arnold, whose fine head was as glossy and white as an almond blossom, yet whose volce and features were search ing and gravely just. When he read line first of his chosen text, did not your con, science incline to prick you2 Did mol consistency give you gentle nudge as he read the second clause2 And, if there happened to be third clause, did you mol shiver from your youth up9 And, as you now pass the dear old sanctuary, where c hundred memories cluster just within, dos catch the echo of the sound of the pil grim's staff upon the stair, and stern bu rather Winsome voice saYinQ. oComa u